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	Prime Minister's Release of Cabinet Leadership Aspirants Akaash Maharaj has released the following statement after the Prime Minister's announcement that Cabinet aspirants to the Party leadership will be allowed to begin their campaigns:
	Toronto - Tuesday 22 October 2002
	"I welcome the Prime Minister's decision to allow Cabinet Ministers to begin their campaigns for the Party leadership in earnest. "A change in leadership should provide our Party with the opportunity to renew itself, to look towards the judgement of history rather than that of the nightly news. For this to be possible, the leadership race must be a meaningful contest between competing visions of the public good. The Prime Minister's release of Cabinet Ministers will broaden the field of individuals and ideas immensely, and will make a true national debate possible. "Both the moral authority of our next Party leader and the health of our country's democracy will hinge upon the vigour of the coming Liberal leadership campaign. It would have been neither in the Liberal Party's interest nor in the public interest to restrain Cabinet Ministers and subdue the leadership race any longer. "If the leadership of the Liberal Party is to be worth winning, Liberals must be patriots before we are partisans. As a member of the Party's National Executive, I believe that we will have to be uncompromising in ensuring that, over the course of this unusually long leadership race, no candidate is allowed to neglect the national interest in the pursuit of his or her ambitions." www.Maharaj.ca For interviews, please contact: David Zurawel Akaash Maharaj Campaign (416) 413 4743 david.zurawel@maharaj.ca